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Friday, January 31, 2014

#897: Bill Lucas & the "Common Sense" Scientists

Bill Lucas is a fundie who runs the website “Common Sense
Science”, which is not about science, but about Lucas rejecting science that
conflicts with “common sense”, where “common sense” is, of course, equivalent
to what Lucas – being a religious fundamentalist – thinks support his
positions. Relativity, for instance, has to go.
As they say “[a]t the end of the 20th century, (Thomas) Barnes,
(David L.) Bergman, [Glen C. Collins, and] Lucas […] began to build on the
older classical work [...] Working outside the mainstream physics establishment,
their common goal was to correct what they perceived as deficiencies in modern
physics by reapplying what they deemed to be sound scientific methods […] By
striving to maintain the principles of reality, causality and unity throughout
their work, they hoped to bring ‘common sense’ back to the field of physics.” In other words, replace the scientific method
with their own intuitions – which is sort of missing a rather important point.

So what are they up to? “Common Sense Science is a body of
theory regarding matter and forces that describes the physical world using
geometric models, absolute time and Galilean space […] The foundational
principles of CSS theory are based upon the law of cause and effect and the
assertion that the universe and all natural phenomena are fundamentally
electrical in character. These principles have led to the derivation of a
universal force law that applies on all scales ranging from the sub-atomic to
the cosmic domain and to the development of physical models for elementary
particles, nuclei, atoms and molecules. Although the new models are novel and in
many ways strikingly different from the standard model of elementary particles,
they have an inherent simplicity and physical form that appeals to common
sense.” It doesn’t fit with reality,
of course, but the premise of their work is precisely that when common sense
and reality come into conflict, reality must go.

After all, Lucas et al. claim to have Jesus on their side –
rummaging through the website you won’t find any evidence for anything, but
instead repeated assertions that their model is compatible with Judeo-Christian
beliefs. Nor does it add up mathematically, but of course: the number one
problem with new scientific theories is that “[p]hysical models of matter were
replaced with mathematical equations”. In other words, math is bad since it is
not commonsensical, and it fails to be commonsensical because it doesn’t give
Lucas et al. the results they need to maintain their Biblically based theories.
Crackpottery rarely comes more thoroughly cracked than that.

In their page on “Atomism and Quantum Mechanics”, they launch a diatribe against
Lucretius, claiming that all of modern physics is derived from the idea of
atomism as proposed by Lucretius, and that Lucretius proposed atomism not as an
explanation for how things work, but as a way of freeing mankind from the bonds of
religion. “Lucretius, not Darwin, has been the principal spokesman for
evolution during the last two millennia,” and the relevance just strikes you
purely intuitively and commonsensically.

Instead, they propose their own model of the atom,
on which Lucas has given a number of presentation (including at universities,
as sponsored by Campus Bible Fellowships): “The presentation in is the form of
a PowerPoint using many pictures to explain the new theory of gravity that
supports a Biblical view of creation.” Who needs evidence when you’ve got a
PowerPoint with many pictures? Lucas also has a presentation on “Expanding Earth:
Evidence For Biblical Creation”.

Diagnosis:
As shining and brilliant example of delusional crackpottery as you are likely
to find, and as so often the insanity is attributed to Jesus.
The Common Sense Scientists are, however, at present rather old and feeble, and
probably rather harmless.